All or nothing thinking and ADHD can be an uncomfortable combination, particularly when you’re trying to slow down, take a break or allow yourself to do a little less.
You finally have an afternoon to yourself. There are things you could be doing, but you’ve decided to leave them for another day.
Perhaps you make a cup of tea, watch something on television or spend a little longer chatting to a friend.
For a while, it feels quite nice.
Then your mind starts wandering towards everything you haven’t done.
The emails you haven’t answered. The work you were going to finish. The exercise routine you’ve neglected. The jobs that are still waiting.
Before long, what was supposed to be a relaxing afternoon has turned into a conversation with yourself about whether you’re becoming lazy, losing motivation or letting things slip.
And you might start wondering why you can’t just enjoy having some time off.
How All or Nothing Thinking and ADHD Connect
All or nothing thinking, also called black and white thinking, is when we view situations in extremes, with very little room for anything in between.
We’re either productive or wasting time.
Following our routines or completely off track.
Doing well or failing.
There’s not much space for an ordinary day when we manage some things, leave others and decide that a few jobs can wait.
For people with ADHD, this can become particularly difficult when motivation, attention and energy fluctuate.
You might recognise periods when you’re completely absorbed in something, working for hours, full of ideas and enthusiasm. Then there are other times when getting started feels almost impossible.
After experiencing these extremes, it can be difficult to trust that there’s a middle ground.
Doing a little less can start to feel dangerously close to doing nothing at all.
When a Good Week Feels Uncomfortable
Imagine you’ve had a better week than usual.
You’ve been less strict with yourself. Maybe you’ve relaxed your exercise routine, eaten what you fancied rather than following a particular diet, or decided to do something spontaneous instead of sticking to your plans.
You might have gone away for a night, spent time with friends or simply enjoyed yourself without thinking too much about what you should be doing next.
And you’ve actually felt better.
There’s less pressure, you’re more relaxed and you’ve enjoyed having some freedom from your usual expectations.
Yet something is still bothering you.
An uncomfortable feeling you can’t quite explain.
You know you’ve had a good week, so why do you feel uneasy?
Could it be guilt?
When you’ve spent years following routines, setting goals and keeping yourself accountable, a little freedom can feel surprisingly uncomfortable.
Perhaps there’s also a worry that relaxing your expectations now will make it difficult to return to them.
One missed gym session might become a month. A few days away from work could turn into weeks.
It’s interesting how quickly a positive experience can become something we feel we need to justify.
All or Nothing Thinking and ADHD: Losing Momentum
I think this is an important part of all or nothing thinking in ADHD that we don’t always talk about.
It’s not necessarily that we dislike resting. We might be exhausted and desperate for a break.
The difficulty is that we don’t always trust ourselves to get going again.
If you’ve experienced ADHD task paralysis, procrastination or difficulty restarting something after a break, you’ll probably recognise this.
You know how much effort it can take to build momentum.
Perhaps you’ve spent weeks getting into a routine, working through a project or finally feeling on top of things.
Once you’re there, you don’t want to lose it.
So you keep going, even when you’re tired or the enjoyment has disappeared.
Taking some time away might do you good, but there’s that worry in the back of your mind that stopping could mean having to start all over again.
And starting again can feel like an enormous task.
When Productivity Becomes Part of Who We Are
There’s another side to this that’s worth exploring.
What happens when being busy becomes part of how we see ourselves?
Perhaps you’re the person who gets things done. The one who takes responsibility, works hard, helps other people and always has something on the go.
You might even feel quite proud of how much you manage.
And why wouldn’t you?
Especially if you’ve spent years finding ways to compensate for ADHD difficulties, working harder to stay organised or trying to meet expectations that seem to come more naturally to other people.
But what happens when you can’t keep doing everything?
You might be exhausted, unwell or simply reaching a point where something needs to change.
Suddenly, you’re doing less than you’re accustomed to.
Instead of recognising that your circumstances have changed, you start questioning yourself.
Am I losing interest in my work?
Why don’t I feel as motivated as I used to?
What if I never get back to how I was?
Does this mean I don’t care as much anymore?
It’s quite a leap, isn’t it?
We’ve gone from needing a break to questioning our motivation, our abilities and sometimes even our identity.
Yet that leap can feel completely convincing when we’re caught up in it.
Why Rest Can Bring Guilt
For some people, rest has always felt like something that needs to be earned.
You finish your work, complete the household jobs, answer the messages and make sure everyone else is sorted.
Then you can relax.
Except there’s nearly always something else that needs doing.
With ADHD, unfinished tasks can have a way of remaining very present in our minds.
You might be sitting watching television, but you’re also thinking about the washing upstairs, the message you haven’t replied to and the appointment you need to arrange.
Physically, you’re resting. Mentally, you’re still working through your list.
And perhaps there’s another question worth asking.
When you feel guilty about resting, whose expectations are you trying to meet?
Are they your own, or have you picked them up over the years?
Maybe you’ve become so used to proving that you’re capable, responsible and hardworking that doing less feels like letting yourself down.
For people who’ve spent years hearing that they need to try harder, be more organised or make better use of their time, recognising when they’re already doing enough can be surprisingly difficult.
Can You Trust Yourself to Stop?
I wonder whether the connection between all or nothing thinking and ADHD also has something to do with how much we trust ourselves.
Not necessarily trusting ourselves to make the right decision about taking a break, but trusting that we’ll be able to pick things up again when we’re ready.
Perhaps you’ve experienced times when a short break turned into weeks of struggling to get started. Or you’ve lost interest in something that once felt really important to you.
Those experiences can stay with us.
We start to believe that the only way to keep things going is to never completely stop.
But what if trusting ourselves isn’t about knowing that we’ll always be motivated, organised or consistent?
What if it’s about recognising that our energy and motivation will change, that some things might take longer than expected, and that we can find ways to begin again?
Perhaps we don’t need to hold on quite so tightly to everything to know that it still matters to us.
Finding the Middle Ground
This is another way all or nothing thinking and ADHD can make finding a middle ground difficult.
We can start treating slowing down and giving up as though they’re the same thing.
But are they?
If you decide to work fewer hours for a while, does that mean you’re no longer committed to your work?
Missing a few days of exercise doesn’t mean you’ve abandoned your health. Spending a weekend doing very little doesn’t mean you’ve lost your motivation.
We can usually recognise these distinctions when we’re looking at somebody else’s situation.
You might encourage a friend to take a break, enjoy themselves or stop putting so much pressure on themselves.
Yet when it’s our own life, the rules can be surprisingly different.
Perhaps the middle ground is allowing ourselves to have days when we do a little work and then stop.
Weeks when we maintain some routines but relax others.
Or times when we choose to do something enjoyable simply because we feel like it.
Not everything needs to become a new habit, a goal or something we have to maintain.
And taking a break doesn’t necessarily mean we’ve lost our enthusiasm for the things that matter to us.
What If Doing Less Is Enough?
I wonder how different rest might feel if we didn’t immediately start worrying about what it meant.
If we could enjoy a quiet afternoon without questioning whether we’d wasted it, or have a week with fewer expectations without worrying that we’d somehow lost our way.
Our motivation, energy and capacity naturally change, and we don’t always need to push ourselves back to where we were.
The next time you notice that uncomfortable feeling when you’re doing less, perhaps you could get curious about it.
Is it guilt, a fear of losing momentum, or simply the unfamiliar feeling of allowing yourself some space?
Because there’s quite a difference between choosing to do less and giving up on something that matters to you.
And perhaps we don’t need to decide what a few quieter days mean for the rest of our lives.
